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THE LAST KNIGHT 

AND OTHER POEMS 



THE 

LAST KNIGHT 

AND OTHER POEMS 

BY 

THEODORE MAYNARD 




NEW YORK 

FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 






Copyright, ig2t, by 
Frederick A. Stokes Company 



All rights reserved 



FEB -5 1921 



©CI.A605678 



TO 

MY MOTHER 

,1 

To you I owe 

The blood of a Gael, 
The laughter I wear 

As a coat of mail. 

To you I owe 

My gift of scorn, 
That I took from you 

On the day I was born. 

To you I owe 

My strength of belief — 
Though the credo I utter 

Has brought you grief. 

To you I owe 

My songs, each one; 
For you hushed with music 

Your little son. 



These poems were first pubKshed by the follow- 
ing journals, and are now reprinted by the courtesy 
of their respective editors : 

In England : The New Witness , The New Age, 
The Mouthy The English Review, The Sunday Times, 
The Poetry Review, Today, Studies, Vision, Black- 
friar s. The Englishman, A Miscellany of Poetry, 
igig. 

In the United States : The North American Re- 
view, The Catholic World, America, The Lyric, 
Harper* s Magazine, The Rosary Magazine, The 
Outlook, A Miscellany of Poetry, iQig. 



CONTENTS 

PART I PAGE 

Laus Deo 3 

The Last Knight 6 

The Scimitar 9 

The Sword 10 

St. George 13 

Night 16 

The Marriage of the Dawn 18 

Sun 21 

Summer Rain 23 

Earth's Green Ways 25 

Legend 26 

Vagabondage 30 

Enchantment 33 

Sunday Morning at Marlow 35 

Highwayman's Song 37 

The Heavenly Tavern 38 

A Song of Drunken Weather 40 

Rahab 42 

O Felix Culpa! 44 

Chivalry 46 

PART n 

Aubade 49 

The Lover's Silence 50 

Secrets 51 

Desideravi 52 

If Ever You Come to Die 53 

Dirge 55 

Remembrance 57 

Conquerors 58 

Holiday 59 

[viil 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Unuttered 6i 

Marriage 63 

Divorce 65 

For M. F. A. M 67 

Michaelmas Day 68 

PART III 

Sonnets From an Unfinished Sequence . . 73 

PART IV 

Annunciation 81 

Simplicity 84 

Meekness 86 

Patience 88 

Temperance 90 

Chastity 91 

The Manichee 93 

The Image of God ........ loi 

Ballad of Christmas-Night 103 

PARTV 

To the Easter Dead (1918) 109 

To France no 

The Paradox of Victory in 

The Last Crusade 113 

The City of the Dead 115 

The New World 117 

PART VI 

Six Epitaphs 121 

PART VII 
An Inscription Written With a New Fountain 

Pen used for the First Time .... 129 

The Denial 130 

A Fisherman's Story 131 

Ballade of Beelzebub 132 

Ballade of a Lost Road 134 

Beauty Beneath Whose Hand 136 

Epilogue 138 

[viiij 



THE LAST KNIGHT 

AND OTHER POEMS 



PART I 



LAUS DEO I 

PRAISE ! that when thick night circled over me 
In chaos ere my time or world began, 
Thy finger shaped my body cunningly, 

Thy thought conceived me ere I was a man 1 
Thy Spirit breathed upon me in the dark 

Wherein I strangely grew. 
Bestowing glowing powers to the spark 
The mouth of heaven blew! 

Praise I that a babe I leapt upon the world 

Spread at my feet in its magnificence, 
With trees as giants, flowers as flags unfurled, 

And rains as diamonds in their excellence I 
Praise I for the solemn splendour of surprise 

That came with breaking day; 
For all the ranks of stars that met my eyes 

When sunset burned away ! 

Praise! that there burst on my unfolding heart 
The coloured radiance of leafy June, 

With choirs of song-birds perfected in art. 

And nightingales beneath the summer moon — 

Praise ! that this beauty, an unravished bride 
Doth hold her lover still; 

[3] 



LAUS DEO! 

Doth hide and beckon, laugh at me, and hide 
Upon each grassy hill. 

Praise! that I know the dear capricious sky 

In every infinitely varied mood, — 
Yet under her maternal wings can lie 

The smallest chick among her countless brood! 
Praise ! that I hear the strong winds wildly race 

Their chariots on the sea. 
But feel them lift my hair and stroke my face 

Softly and tenderly ! 

Praise ! for the joy and gladness Thou didst send 

When I have sat in gracious fellowship 
In twilight for an evening with a friend, 

When wine and magic entered at the lip ! 
For laughter which the fates can overthrow 

Thy mercy doth accord — 
To Thee, who didst my godlike joy bestow, 

I lift my glass, O Lord ! 

Praise ! that a lady leaning from her height, 

A lady pitiful, a tender maid, 
A queen majestical unto my sight, 

Spoke words of love to me, and sweetly laid 

[4] 



LA us DEO! 

Her hand within my own unworthy hand I 

(Rise, soul, to greet thy guest, 
Mysterious love, whom none shall understand. 

Though love be all confessed!) 

Praise ! that upon my bent and bleeding back 

Was stretched some share of Thy redeeming 
cross, 
Some poverty as largess for my lack. 

Some loss that shall prevent my utter loss I 
Praise! that thou gavest me to keep joy sweet 

The sanguine salt of pain ! 
Praise ! for the weariness of questing feet 

That else might quest in vain ! 



[s] 



THE LAST KNIGHT 



Iride, I ride, with my memories of Avalon, 
The last of the hundred knights that were my 
peers, 
With the jesting and the jousting and the glory of 
the tournaments, 
The laughter of the ladies ringing in my ears. 



But I have made an end of all my challenges; 

The gallant days have gone beyond recall — 
Although I ride through the furthest bounds of 
Heathenesse, 

Silence and the sleep of death enwrap them all. 

Why should they stir, when all the lords of Chris- 
tendom, 
Save I, are sealed beneath the heavy stone? 
Why should they shout from the turrets of their 
citadels 
At one old fool who rides the world alone? 

Better, by God, were their ancient hate and arro- 
gance — 
Our churches wrecked, and our fruitful fields 
laid bare; 

[6] 



THE LAST KNIGHT 

The ambush and the sortie and the charges of our 
chivalry, 
The clangour of the battlefields that filled the 
air! 

But now they have conquered. In a cold and cruel 
quietness 
They hold their peace with a scorn too deep 
for scorn I 
I ride and I ride — but this dotard of a paladin 
Can bring no answer to his angry horn. 

Could I find a man with belief enough for bias* 
phemy, 
I would love him well for his hatred of my 
creed. 
But the minds of men are rotted with their toler- 
ance, 
And doubt eats their wills like a hungry weed 1 

I ride, I ride — for until a paynim fight with me, 
My weary bones shall never find their grave. 

Though rest be sweet I can never have a resting- 
place 
Until my sword is red with a stroke it gave. 

[7] 



THE LAST KNIGHT 

Perhaps I shall find it — as a man finds fairyland — 
And see it glimmering at the fall of eve, 

Perhaps a paynim knight will answer to my chal- 
lenging, 
And men will die for the lie that they believe. 

That would be something ! For if I could but see 
again 
A faith, though false, — then the true would 
surely thrive. 
And doubt give way to dogma, and truth come to 
be again 
Passionate and lovely in a soul alive ! 



[8] 



THE SCIMITAR 

THIS IS a scimitar 
By a magician made, 
Wrought in a cavern underground: 
Upon Its glistening blade 
Are graven the praise of Mahound 
And the ninety-nine names of God; 
Set in the handle of jade 
Trembles a blood-red star — > 
Who gazes that jewel in 
Grows mightier far than sin, 
For the jewel's holding gives 
Lordship of earth and air; 
And the monstrous genii come, 
At the Caliph's clap or nod, 
To bring him a houri fair 
To add to his thousand wives. 

But more — If his pleasure tires, 
Black eunuchs, fearful and dumb, 
Must whip their bow-strings out 
To wind round that* slender throat. 
Which the Caliph no longer desires. 
They shall press out its silver note 
And tie her white body about 

[9] 



THE SCIMITAR 

With smooth and silken cords — 
For this, for this was the sword*s 
Secret fashioning underground, 
For this the praise of Mahound 
And the ninety-nine names of God- 
To give to the Caliph's nod 
Such marvellous potency 
Through that jewel of destiny. 



[lo] 



THE SWORD 

TO that dear garden, shut since Adam fell, 
Grown o'er with moss and fern and ivied 
tree, 
No man shall dare to pass the sentinel 

Who bears the sword of God's dread chivalry. 

Within those forests crazy and decayed 

No panther tracks her^ame or rears her young; 

No bird from Paradise has ever strayed 
To build its nest the blessed boughs among. 

A fountain of pure silence, dead as stone. 
Fixed in its leap and frozen in cascade, 

Stands in the centre — since a man alone 
Lost his young innocence and grew afraid. 

Wings there no longer rustle in the brake ; 

Save tangled weeds there grow no living things : 
Since Eve learned good and evil from the snake 

Above the roof of heaven a sword still swings. 

Yet some have cut a path through bush and brier, 
And blown a horn in challenge at the gate — 

Only to see as end of their desire, 

A sword made sharp, a garden desolate. 



THE SWORD 

Weary their woes through many questing years, 
While red rust ate their armour and their 
shields — 

Only to find the grass as tall as spears 

And that archangel who, in guarding, seals. 

This much is given such an one to hold. 

Though he be frustrate and denied the grace 

To cross the door — a sword made bright and cold, 
And anger blazing strongly on his face. 

This shall he keep as comfort from his Lord, 
Who seeing Eden could not enter in. 

The accolade from His indignant sword, 
The spurs, the crest, the name of Paladin I 



[12] 



H 



ST. GEORGE 

E reins his horse and listens. The risen lark 
sings over 

The edge of a cloud In a sky washed clean 
with dew. 
This is the England he knew of springing grass 
and clover, 
This Is the England he knew. 

Earth makes her familiar gesture. The trees into 
pondage 
Foam like frozen fountains released, but spill 
no green. 
Blue-bells from ancient roots, oblivious of recent 
frondage 
Are crowding the trees between. 

He sits stock-still in his saddle. Holding his spear 
he listens, 
Hearing In happy silence the lyric of a bird. 

The early morning sun on a million dew-points 
glistens . . . 
The Knight has not spoken or stirred. 

[13] 



ST, GEORGE 

For here contentment holds him within her quiet 
places : 
All else he shall find will be evil, but here is 
good; 
Hearts that are cold he shall find^ and cruel or 
sullen faces, 
Far away from the leafy wood. 

Whinnies his horse to be gone ; but the knight re- 
luctant lingers 
Where thin mist faintly rises, where no factory- 
shafts appear. 
His love clings close to ground ; but his lips grow 
tight and his fingers 
Grow tighter around his spear. 

When so much else had changed had these not 
remained unchanging 
The secret streams, the greenwood, each little 
irregular field. 
With memories of Robin Hood and the Lincoln 
Jackets ranging — 
He had cast aside his shield. 

Though the rich have taken bribes, and the poor 
have followed blindly 
[H] 



ST. GEORGE 

The bidding of alien lords, and are minding 

their engines' wheels; 
Though colour slowly fades from their lives-— 

their lives are kindly, 
Despite the chains at their heels. 

'Were it not so," thought the knight, "The 
myriad-headed dragon 
Should eat this England up, while I held my 
angry hand. 
But, by God, I hope for better things, for farm 
and fair and flagon — 
And a sword to save this land!" 

He reins his horse and listens. The risen lark 
sings over 
The edge of a cloud in a sky washed clean with 
dew. 
This is the England he knew of springing grass 
and clover. 
This is the England he knew. 



[IS] 



NIGHT 

(i) 

BEFORE the onslaught of the night the day, 
Desperately guarding his last stronghold, 
died 
Among the flaming hills, where ray on ray 

Flickered and fell like Lucifer in pride. 
Then silent clamour filled the heights of heaven 
With shouts of colour the eyes can see, and 
cheers 
Of painted music, as the planets seven 

Bore down the failing twilight with their spears. 

And while the winds made mournful requiem 

Over that battlefield heroical, 
Chaunting slain captains and the deeds of them — 

The night rode by upon the moon with all 
The armies of the stars in slow procession, 

Taking the earth and skies for her possession. 



[i6] 



NIGHT 
(ii) 

NOT always with such pomp does night de- 
scend 
Winged powerfully with gold and crimson 
clouds; 
But when day makes her treasonable end 

Leads on, not stars, but evil shapes in crowds. 
Hobgoblins, witches, ghosts beneath the cover 

Of this wide leaden dome contrive their charms 
To spoil the blessed dreams of each sweet lover 
Asleep with his sweet lover in his arms. 

The wicked night her invitation utters 
To lost souls for abominable carouse ; 

A wet and wailing wind between the shutters, 
Beneath the door and through the keyhole 
blows ; 

Hands pull the curtains; and the candle gutters; 
And children scream for terror in the house. 



[17] 



THE MARRIAGE OF THE DAWN 

AWAKEN I cast away the smell of sleep 
Out of your nostrils I To the narrow room 
Shuttered by death, let in the wide 
Bright sunlight from the deep 

Where Dawn is waiting lovely as a bride ! 
Rise up, rise up my soul, and go to meet 
The shy and lingering hurry of her feet, 

Moving to greet the longing of her groom! 

Awaken to that wonder and your joy ! 

The cerements that bound your mind are gone, 
Melted before the rising light. 
Now mightily employ 

Your powers to their exultant task; gird on 
The shining sword of your great ecstasy, 
Before whose edge the legioned glooms must be 
Turned utterly to swift precipitous flight. 

Thus shall you win your wedding with your fair — 
Bring garlands from the woods, and sweetly fill 
Your hair with yellow flowers, array 
Your body and prepare 

Its pomp with care for this its nuptial day — 
For heralded with bells Dawn comes to you, 

[i8] 



THE MARRIAGE OF THE DAWN 

Leading along her merry retinue 

Laughing and dancing with her down the hill. 

Upon the grassy slopes beneath the sky 

Your hands shall build your rosy marriage bed; 
The young sun from the rim of heaven 
Shall bless you as you lie 

Gilded with glory while your love is given. 
Pluck tenderly and freely of delight 
In this surrender, while no folds of night 

Hang, specked with gold, a canopy o'erhead. 

But press your wooing ardently and soon, 

While still on leaf and petal shines the dew. 
While love is coy and magical; 
Tween daybreak and the noon 

Few are the joyous moments that will fall 
Apt for the capture of the virgin heart 
Of Dawn, who growing old, must then depart 
And wrench your rapture utterly from you. 

A fleeting splendour ! How should there endure 
A prolongation of your burning zest? 
But turn and seize love while it last; 
When Time's so insecure, 

[19] 



THE MARRIAGE OF THE DAWN 

Then ravish the instant ere that it be passed I 
The noonday lifts herself above the world — 
Let limbs cling closer, soon to be uncurled — 
Kiss, while you may, her lips and hair and 
breast 1 



[20] 



SUN 

SLEEPER In primal darkness, who first heard 
God break eternal silence with a word, 
That stirred the chaos into form and flame; 
That clove the day from night; that gave a name 
In turn to every torch-enkindled star — 
Eldest brother, thou, to all things that are ! 
Beneath thy ray, revealed in light and shade, 
Water took wings; the firmament was made; 
And earth, arising out of ocean, bore 
Fruit trees whose seed lies at the fruit's deep core. 
And thou and thy sweeter sister. Moon, were 

given 
Dominion o'er the burning lamps of heaven. 
Which mark the seasons and which pull the tides 
And hold the line where day from night divides. 

Warmed through, the great sea monsters spouted 

foam; 
Fish swam the seas; the wild birds built a home; 
The long procession of the beasts began; 
And God in His Own image created man. 

Thy raging anger through the cosmos sheds 

A benediction on a billion heads. 

Thine is the hearth at which creation stands, 

[21] 



SUN 

Toasting before thy fire its sides and hands. 
Thy universal domesticity 
Comforts the purring cat, the apple tree, 
The dragon fly and all things that draw life 
As equally as Adam and his wife. 

When the last frozen fountain is released, 
And the last harvest of the world increased 
By thy beneficence; when last there dies 
Sunset as an emperor upon the skies ; 
When neither feeble nor with breast grown cold, 
Thou perish as the prophet has foretold — 
Washed over and drowned in dreadful seas of 

blood — 
And earth is drenched with fire as with a flood: 
If (as I think may be) each man may take 
Some relic of the sun . . . for her dear sake 
ril choose that shaft of light she used to wear 
On sunny days amid her mortal hair. 



[22] 



SUMMER RAIN 

— who have tried to learn 
How I could find 
Everywhere marks of her 

Spirit and mind; 
How she is mingled with 
Earth, to the water kith, 
How the bright sparks of her 

Fly on the wind — 

Saw her, where wet leaves sway 

Under the breeze 
Fall with the faltering 

Light through the trees ; 
Fall where wild grasses lift 
Flowers like skies adrift — 
Touching and altering 

All the eye sees. 

Through the drenched undergrowth 

Solitude brings 
Silencers lyrical 

Quivering strings. 
Here where no footsteps stir 
Solitude sings of her; 

[23] 



SUMMER RAIN 

Silence — a miracle ! — 
Sings of her, sings. 

Thrilled, in the distance, 

The note of a bird 
Faintly — a lonely sound I — 

Was it her word 
Cried in the rain-washed wood? 
Deep in the grass I stood 
Hoarding the only sound 

That my heart heard. 



[24] 



EARTH'S GREEN WAYS 

1 WANDER in the earth's green ways, and 
stare 
With steady happiness at all my finding, 
Intent and dumb ... A heavy crown of care 
Lifted from off my head. A chain was binding 
My feet, lest they should go ; a mist was blind- 
ing 
My eyes, lest they should see the beauty there — 

Cows in the rushes, and the river winding. 
The nimble squirrel clambering his stair. 

Here will I linger on until the amorous 

Earth shall entreat her lover, night, to keep 
His promised tryst. Descending, he will steep 
Her heart in wonder; and in moonlight glamor- 
ous 
Lull watchful men and beasts and birds 
asleep — 
Till day-dawn glimmers and the cocks grow clam- 
orous. 



[25] 



LEGEND 

*No man dare take of that fruit for it is a thing of fairie.' 

— Mandeville's Travels. 

1 WALKED within my garden 
Under the sun's strong ray, 
When the turbaned merchants passed me 
As they journeyed to Cathay. 

They passed me with goblin camels 

Coal black and white as milk, 
Carrying bales of richest spices 

And diamonds and furs and silk; 

Carrying blood-red jewels 

For the gold of the great queen's hair 
And glittering coats of silver 

For the Chan himself to wear. 

The crafty merchants passed me 

With faces eager and thin 
To the far and fabulous Indies 

Where a fabulous wealth they win. 

They went through the lanes of England, 
There in the strong sunlight — 

Those dim and ghostly creatures 

Who should only have walked by night. 

[26] 



LEGEND 

And I ran beside the caravan, 

As it journeyed on and on, 
Until we reached the bounds of the earth 

In the country of Prester John. 

From the hill's familiar summit, 

Where the road swerves down to the right, 
The shining city of Prester John 

Lay naked to the sight. 

At the close of an hour's long travel, 

At the foot of the quiet lane. 
Palaces and pinnacles 

Shot upwards from the plain. 

And the little stream ran aquiver 

With jewels to the brim. 
Making a lordly flood for the sea 

That shone at the world's rim. 

It flowed 'twixt the trees of that country, 
Ten thousand leagues and more 

From the spot where I met the merchants 
Passing my own oak door. 

The marvellous birds of that country 
In the leafage on either hand 

[27] 



LEGEND 

Sang, while the river glittered 
And glided to the sea of sand. 

And the fruit upon the branches 

Hung thick and ruddy and sweeten — 

But because it was a thing of fairie 
I dared not eat. 

Because it was a thing of fairie 

And I but a mortal man, 
A sudden fear gave wings to my feet 

And from that land I ran. 

I ran from the country of Prester John 

That sparkled in the light. 
Till the cool green hedge of my garden 

Came again in sight. 

I saw in my quiet garden 

The apples hang ripe on the bough, 
And the rows of dear and friendly flowers 

That in my garden grow. 

And on the kindly roof of my house 

Was cast no enchanted thing 
Nor any spell, but only mystery 

For the hearths comforting. 



LEGEND 

And as one rose up to greet me — 

Than the Chan's youngest daughter more 
fair — 

The sun released an arrow 

That alighted amidst her hair. 



[291 



VAGABONDAGE 

DUSTY of shoes and dented of hat- 
Beggars — we knock on this door and that; 
Beggars whose bodies are weary and old 
We whimper for shelter, shut out in the cold : 
Kind folk, peep through your windows and see 
The rags of our sorrowful beggary ! 

An ancient madness has driven us forth 

To East and West and South and North — 

Though gold upon our palms has lain thick 

Of men and of cities our hearts have grown sick, 

Of narrow skies and of dust and of din — 

Lift up the latch and let us come in ! 

Draw back the bolts and the stout stiff bars 

For vagabonds homeless beneath the stars I 

We fain would find a welcome to sit 

Where the glowworm's friendly lantern is lit . . . 

To the fellowship of fur and of wing 

Our sorrowful ditty we sing: 

We hear not a word that is spoken 

Under the greenwood tree; — 
No sound of that jovial laughter, 

That feasting and revelry! 

[30] 



VAGABONDAGE 

The great roots jest together 

Deep in the ruddy earthy 
But never a lonely mortal 

Is partner to that mirth. 

For the secretive hills are jealous 
Lest man should overhear^ 

And they guard their hoary fables 
From every human ear. 

Though crickets sing in the twilight 
And larks ascend in the morn, 

No whisper of their songs* meaning 
Ever comes to the women-horn. 

For this we have given up kinsfolk 

And household and household fire, 

To find in the silver house of the snail 
The end of our desire. 

But though men were scornful and hitter 

And pitiless of face — 
O small folk, are you more ready 

To give us a resting place? 
[31] 



VAGABONDAGE 

Beggars with bellies drawn tightly in 

We seek our nightly shelter to win; 

Yet no beast lifts a kindly eye 

To welcome such vagabonds passing by. 

If you'll give us a crust of your fairy bread 

And a petal of dew, we'll be comforted — 

But no living thing will answer the door 

Though we tramp and trudge the wide world o'er 



[32] 



ENCHANTMENT 

BECAUSE my childhood only knew 
The burning sands and white, 
Where cactus and palmyra grew 
In bright and bitter light — 

That day the English cliffs were seen, 
With meadows cool and kind 

All covered with the grass so green, 
Comes often to my mind. 

A little Anglo-Indian boy 

The Dorset field I trod, 
Beholding buttercups with joy 

And daisies meek like God. 

I found, a little older grown. 

In Surrey woods of pine 
A stranger thing to keep and own 

Than that young zest of mine. 

A wind that smote me as I sat. 
With buffets strong and sharp. 

When the wind of love awoke thereat 
To play my heart as a harp. 

[33] 



ENCHANTMENT 

But yet those vales are not so dear, 
As where the gales are loud 

And skies are iron and austere 
From Cirencester ^ to Stroud. 

Where little houses built of stone 
In crowded hamlets stand, 

Because they fear to stand alone 
In that enchanted land. 

My mind with pain and happiness, 

In thinking on it, fills 
Where the grave silence comes to bless 

The everlasting hills. 

* Locally pronounced Cicester. 



[341 



SUNDAY MORNING AT MARLOW 

LAST night as I came up the lane 
Towards the house that's mine, 
I saw the thin young moon again 
Among the planets shine. 

Between the trees that lined my way 

A wintry whisper stirred 
I knew the frost would wake ere day 

Like some sweet early bird. 

I knew the fingers of the mist 

Would falter in their hold 
When once a glowing sun had kissed 

A world of glowing cold. 

And now as I go up the hills 

This morning after Mass, 
I see how powdered silver fills 

The rolling fields of grass. 

I hear below me as I climb 

The hills where quiet dwells 
A music of recurrent rhyme 

And rhythm from the bells. 

[35] 



SUNDAY MORNING AT MARLOPF 

It trembles on the frosty air 

Among the frosty woods, 
Far off, far off and silver clear 

Among my solitudes. 



[36] 



HIGHWAYMAN'S SONG 

WHILE a horse Is left In stable; 
While I've pistols and a sword, — 
Does the Sheriff think he's able 
For to swing me on a cord? 
While a woman's worth the winning; 

While there's wine that's fit to drink; 
While there's still delight In sinning 
I'll be safe enough, I think! 

If at last the runners catch me 

With my pockets stuffed with gold — 
At the least when they dispatch me, 

I'll be saved from growing old. 
All my doxies will be crying 

As I mount the gallows-stairs — 
That's a good death to be dying; 

I can spare the Parson's prayers I 



[37] 



THE HEAVENLY TAVERN 

{Sung by the exile in America) 

1 FOUND in the inn upon the hill 
An ale which body and soul can fill, 
Ale as strong as the drinkers who sit 
Drinking and praising the glory of it. 

I drank a flagon, I drank a pot; 
I treated the company, paid the shot, 
And hearty and happy, a man content, 
I gave them my blessing and out I went. 

IVe discovered that inn in many a town 

With its score of good fellows whom nothing 
can drown — 

And we've sometimes sat there till the morn- 
ing was pink 

And nothing was left in the house to drink. 

Whene'er I walked singing along the lane 
I found that mystical inn again. 
Whatever the village, whatever the shire — 
The same jolly topers beside the same fire I 

[38] 



THE HEAVENLY TAVERN 

But when I went sailing across the sea- — 

Alas I that inn didn't travel with me ! 

IVe left it and lost it . . . oh, where shall I 

find 
Any comfort of body or rapture of mind? 



[39] 



A SONG OF DRUNKEN WEATHER 

ALL night the rain came down amain, 
A raging, drunken storm, 
But we sat snug with fire and mug 

That kept us safe and warm. 
Such weather hardly can be mended 
When drinking is the thing intended; 
And such a night too soon is ended 
That kept us safe and warm. 

We left the inn where men can win 

A kindness born of ale. 
And with hearts made wise and merry eyes 

Went out into the gale. 
With joy between us like a tether 
We met the jolly English weather. 
In which the sun and wind together 

Go out to make a gale. 

We need not grieve the beer we leave 

Behind us in the bar; 
For every tree is drunk, and we 

Are even as they are. 
Though all must reel and some go under. 
We're not so drunk but we can wonder 

[40] 



A SONG OF DRUNKEN WEATHER 

To hear a drinking song like thunder 
About us where we are. 

We do not shrink to take our drink, 

And neither do the hills 
Who drank all night for their delight 

The flagons heaven fills. 
But nights of rain last not for ever; 
We're full as is the flooding river — 
So thank our God the great drink giver, 

For all the pots He fills I 



[41] 



RAHAB 

10NLY know that in an hour I lost 
All worth the saving, 
That life lies barren as a land in frost 
With bleak winds raving. 

And though kings kiss me wildly on the lips 

And load my fingers. 
They cannot pay me for my joy's eclipse 
Where no light lingers. 

You give me gold! But is that recompense, 

Sweet lord and lover? 
For that which I have given — my innocence? 

Will you recover 

The happiness I had — forever gone 

Since your eyes found me — 
Walking my lonely gardens all alone, 

My dreams around me ? 

But I may walk the leafy ways no more 

Of those dear gardens. . . . 
The door is shut. I cannot find the door. . . , 

And my heart hardens. 

Desire, you said, would be a steady glow 
(Do you remember?) 

[42] 



RAHAB 

Kneel down again, and stretch your cheeks, and 
blow 
The failing ember ! 

The blaze is still alive ? Let's hope the fire, 

Sweet lord and lover. 
Of Hell will warm us better than desire 

When life is over I 



[43] 



O FELIX CULPA! 

THEN gazed the wild-wood dumb with awe, 
Staring with eyeballs open wide 
On one grown conscious of a law 
And lifted suddenly to pride. 

The apex of creation in 

His shame, creation, envious sees^-n 
Magnificently robed with sin, 

Knowing the roots of mysteries. 

Hot-footed hurrying through the immense 
The winds their happy tidings tell, 

That man, exchanging innocence — 
And gladly — for the fires of hell 

Proves his long-boasted power to choose, 
To leave the good and take the ill; 

Free, with his soul to save or lose, 
By warrant of its royal will. 

But hidden from the awestruck eyes. 
Which see the sentenced rebels go, 
Are those tall towers of Paradise 
Where-through exultant rumours blow; 

[44] 



O FELIX CULPA! 

Where seated at the council board 
The Three-in-One debate Their plan, 

The Incarnation of the Word, 
The sorrows of the Son of Man. 



[45] 



CHIVALRY 

THY Chivalrous love 
Picked up my challenging glove, 
Which I, being young, 
Before Thy face had flung. 

Not always thus 
Is fortune given us ; 
That our bodies feel 
The stroke of heavenly steel. 

Happily cross 

Swords with the Knight of Loss, 

And be overborne 

By His shield of blazoned thorn I 

Suppose He turned 

Away, while my anger burned; 

And let me go, 

Not deigning my overthrow I 

But chivalry 

Fought and defeated me ; 

And generous God 

Smote, healing me with His rod, 

[46] 



PART II 



AUBADE 

HOW shall I waken love who sleeping lies? 
How call him to the windows of your eyes? 
How show him morning splendid with surprise? 
How shall I waken love who sleeping lies? 

How shall I waken love ? He keeps his room 
More strictly than a dead man keeps his tomb — 
Though song-birds sing in gardens bright with 

bloom — ' 
How shall I waken love who sleeping lies? 

How shall I waken love? He lay asleep 

While in the skies the flocks of starry sheep 

The pale moon shepherded. Are dreams so 

deep? 
How shall I waken love who sleeping lies? 

How shall I waken love? If he awake 

What lyrics through our desolate hearts will 

break, 
Which thirst and hunger for his lovely sake I 
How shall I waken love who sleeping lies? 



[49] 



THE LOVER'S SILENCE 

THE lute and starlight lyric — these belong 
To love's novitiate of ardent song, 
When underneath your listening window stood 
A young man singing to your maidenhood. 

Only to see your face against the glass 
He waited patiently upon the grass ; 
Only to see the gold moon gild your hair 
He sent his songs into the evening air. 

But when to love's still chamber he has come, 
His lyric lips with kisses are made dumb; 
And beauty manifested rests above 
The sweet and perfect silence of his love. 



[50] 



SECRETS 

O LITTLE world, you are undone — 
Your secrets flower on bush and tree, 
They glimmer In the morning sun 
And ghtter on the sea ! 

From poet and philosopher 

You lock your treasured secrets up, 

Though shining on your breast you wear 
The golden buttercup. 

The clouds ride on from deep to deep 
And stars are in the windy sky — 

But who can at their beauty leap 
And seize it fluttering by? 



Oh, how can one who has not heard 
The tender love she speaks to me, 

Hear all the love that merry bird 
Is singing on the tree ? 

Or how can one who has not seen 
The look that yields her secret up 

See, shining on the meadows green, 
The golden buttercup. 

[si] 



DESIDERAVI 

LEST, tortured by the world's strong sin, 
Her little bruised heart should die — 
Give her your heart to shelter in, 
O earth and sky! 

Kneel, sun, to clothe her round about 
With rays to keep her body warm ; 

And, kind moon, shut the shadows out 
That work her harm. 

Yes, even shield her from my will's 

Wild folly — hold her safe and close I — 

For my rough hand in touching spills 
Life from the rose. 

But teach me, too, that I may learn 
Your passion, classical and cool: 

To me, who tremble so and burn, 
Be pitiful I 



[52] 



IF EVER YOU COME TO DIE 

IF ever you come to die 
And the world should grow old — 
Millions of years gone by 

Singly as sheep to their fold — 
I think our burnt star would renew 

And enkindle to flame, 
If a memory lived of you 

Or if anyone spoke your name. 

The thin grey dust of your urn, 

The beauty asleep in your grave, 
Would flower the fields, and return 

Mighty in wind and wave, 
The cuckoo repeat his call. 

The chrysalis burst again, 
And laughter happily fall 

Through cities of buried men. 

God knows whether or not 

More than a carved stone shall tell— 
Or a verse In a book forgot — 

Of the lady I love so well : 
But I know that, her story lost. 

The earth must fade like a rose, 

[53] 



IF EVER YOU COME TO DIE 

Ruined by endless frost 

And gripped by pitiless snows 
But even were joy all gone 

As water from empty streams, 
If a poet musing alone 

Could fashion you out of his dreams; 
Though you were only a bodiless sprite 

Then, even then, for your sake 
Would death grow alive with delight 

And a lovely world awake. 



[54J 



DIRGE 

IF on a day it should befall 
That love must have her funeral; 
And men weep tears that love is dead, 
That never more her gracious head 
Can turn to meet their eyes and hold 
Their hearts with chains of silky gold; 
That never more her hands can be 
As dear as was virginity; 
That in her coffin there is laid 
Beauty, the body of a maid, 
The body of one so piteous-sweet, 
With candles burning at her feet 
And cowled monks singing requiem. . . . 

I think I would not go with them, 
Her lordly lovers, to the place 
Where lies that lovely mournful face. 
That curving throat and marvelous hair 
Under the sconces' yellow flare — 
How shall a man be comforted 
When love is dead, when love is dead? 

But I would make my moan apart. 
Keeping my dreams within my heart — 

Iss] 



DIRGE 

For guarded as a sepulchre 
Shall be the house I built for her 
Of silver spires and pinnacles 
With carillons of mellow bells — » 
A house of song for her delight 
Whose joy was as the strong sunlight—-* 
But now love's ultimate word is said, 
For love is dead, for love is deadl 

But even should all hope be lost. 
Some memory, like a thin white ghost. 
Might stealthily move in midnight hours 
Among those silent, sacred towers. 
And glimmer on the moonlit lawn 
Until the cold ironic dawn 
Arises from her saffron bed — 
When love is dead, when love is dead. 



[56] 



REMEMBRANCE 

LET not the world remember you, 
' By any greater thing or less, 
Than that upon a reed I blew 
A song to praise your loveliness I 

Let not the world remember me 
(If immortality should crown 

A line of verse, when empery 

In the vast waves of time goes down) 

By any greater thing or less 

Than one good song I made and sung 
To praise your love and loveliness, 

One evening when the world was young I 



[57] 



CONQUERORS 

CONQUEROR! What can withstand thy 
patience, Time? 
When granite summits crumble grain by grain, 
And deserts gradually freeze with rime — 
Our gates of brass are shut on thee In vain I . 

Conqueror 1 Who can outwit thy ambush, Death? 

Thy sword-stroke through the Knight's strong 
visor thrust 
Shatters the pillar of life ; none galnsayeth 

Thy ravenous worms at work amid the dust I 

Conqueror! greater than these, victorious Love! 

Shall our glad lives hold aught else but thy 
fire — 
Since in a triumph they thy chariot drove 

With Time and Death made captive to Desire ? 



[58] 



HOLIDAY 

WHEN every bird on every tree 
Has sung with all its might; 
When flowers amid the meadow grass 

Are growing in the light — 
Let every heart that leaps at play 

Each butterfly a-wing, 
Rejoice to see a hDliday, 
A holiday, a holiday, 
A happy hearted holiday, 

Because it is the Spring I 

When Christmas snows are on the roof, 

And little children sit, 
Eating their puddings and their pies 

Beneath the candles lit — 
Since God was born on Christmas day, 

Let every girl and boy, 
Ring all the bells of holiday, 
Of holiday, of holiday. 
The jolly bells of holiday. 

That fill the world with joy. 

My love and I in autumn woods 
Sweet scented from the rain 

[59] 



HOLIDAY 

Once wandered for a holiday, 
A holiday, a holiday. 

When love went with us all the way, 

And led us back again. 
And though no Christmas snows that morn 

Lay on the fields so green. 
Yet God within our hearts was born 

The little lamb of God forlorn — 
Because it was a holiday, 
A holiday, a holiday, 
The holy day of holiday. 

When love was in us born. 



feo] 



UNUTTERED 

SHADE In the garden, 
Light on the hill 
Mirror your nature's 
Beautiful will. 

Silence and solitude 
Grow perfect and pass, 

As you come to me laughing 
Over the dew-wet grass. 

But how shall I utter 

Your loveliness, — 
When the wind makes music 

With your rustling dress? 

What song of my singing 
Shall clothe you about, — 

When night wraps you in silver 
As the stars come out? 

How shall I emulate 

The nightingale, — 
Who melts you with tenderness 

In the moonlit vale? 
[6iJ 



UNUTTERED 

Love in its anguish 

Strives and is dumb, 
Waiting for fitting 

Words to come; 

Climbs in a spiral 

Upward and on 
Till the last lamp of the world 

Flickers and is gone ; 

Till the last star is quenched 

Below in the sky; 
Till we stand in immensity,— 

You and I ; 

Till we tread the ethereal 

Rapturous ways, 
And in heavenly language 

I tell your praise. 



[621 



MARRIAGE 

SEEING what mighty men are turned to car- 
rion, 
I well may marvel at the audacious glove 
I flung in challenge, and at the ringing clarion 
I blew against the battlements of love. 

What ardours are they that should so embolden 
A man, that he can go up with dauntless breath, 

To burst the gates of life which though they be 
golden 
Are stronger than the iron doors of death? 

Now, turning back, I stand agape with wonder, 
Knowing the thing unwittingly I dared — 

The blasphemy unanswered by the thunder, 
The Blade in scabbard and the blade unbared. 

For I have wrenched the gates and pillaged the 
city, 

A ruined heaven amid the ravaged skies. 
Only to find unfathomable pity 

Mute and unforgettable within your eyes. 

Loudly I shouted in my fantastic folly. 

Threatening Paradise with a pigmy sword — 

[63] 



MARRIAGE 

A hearth and firelight, mistletoe and holly 
God gave me as ironical reward. 

Little I recked, who now behold with amazement 

The perilous journey that my soul has come, 
The vengeance heaven has taken of sweet abase- 
ment. 
The house where my soul, being satisfied, is 
dumb. 

The love we seize and the love that we surrender, 
These are no longer separate but the same — 

For all the comforting air we breathe is tender 
With all the loveliness of Love's matchless 
name. 



[64] 



DIVORCE 

{Written in Separation) 

NOW that I know that Chance can tear 
Our lives a little while apart, 
When I embrace the empty air, 

Who fain would hold you to my heart — 

I deeplier know a deeper thing 

Than even this dividing sea. 
That cuts, as with a sabre-swing. 

The single selves of you and me. 

Beneath the shadow of divorce 

Our separated bodies lie : 
Dearest, we are one flesh. No force, 

No fate our vows can nullify. 

Around us little lusts decay. 

And undevoted pleasures tire. 
And satisfaction eats away 

The nerve and sinew of desire. 

We know that come what may of ill. 

What shame may stain, what storm may shake 

Our frail mortality — that still 

Our mortal words shall never break. 

[6SJ 



DIVORCE 

There Is no ocean strong enough 
To drag our plighted honour down, 

Which carries on great tides the love 
That many waters cannot drown. 



[66] 



FOR M. F. A. M. 



Born March 24th, 191 9. 



NOT only names but armour 
Do I gird upon 
The tiny breast and shoulders 
Of my new-born son. 

Michael for the captain and leader 

Of God^s glorious host, 
Who rides to battle with the sword 

Of the Holy Ghost. 

Felix for the Roman martyr 

Who drank of doom, 
As gaily as men drink of red wine 

In a supper-room. 

Antony who preached to the fishes 

Alive in the brook, 
To whom, while he read, the Child Jesus 

Came out from his book. 

Not only names but armour 

Have I girded on 
The tiny breast and shoulders 

Of my new-born son. 

[67] 



MICHAELMAS DAY 

{Written for my little son's first fatronal feast.) 

THOUGH heavenly anvils forge their swords 
For your last spiritual campaign; 
Though muster the seraphic lords 

Against the mustering *hosts profane; 

And though you pass in long review 

Your spearmen in their regiments, 
Marking the bows as you pass through, 

The disposition of the tents — 

Yet (giving what the time allows 

From horsemen and from charioteer) 

Bend down your bright and burning brows; 
To lesser matters lend an ear. 

A silence in the skies be made, 

A pause before the clash of war, 
Ere grapple armies now arrayed 

Celestial and secular. . . . 

My little son — to whom I gave 

Your name, angelic general — 
Stand close beside him, quick to save, 

To hold his spirit lest it fall. 

[68] 



MICHAELMAS DAY 

Your sword bestow Its accolade 
Upon his shoulders ; may he wear 

Divinely smithied mail; a blade 
Of righteous anger let him bear. 

Among all men of women born, 
May he be signed upon the breast 

With heraldry of blazing scorn, 
With honour gleaming at his crest. 

With gentleness and chivalry 

Be he endowed; and may he keep 

Unspotted faith and chastity 
Till God give his beloved sleep. 

Then, Michael, bear him In your hands. 
His stainless sword and shield and plume ; 

And stand beside him when he stands 
To plead upon the Day of Doom. 



[69] 



PART III 



SONNETS FROM AN UNFINISHED 
SEQUENCE 



IN those far solitudes where Beauty dwells, 
I heard you faintly ringing like a chime 
O'er twilit waters; and the distant bells 

Accorded with my heart as rhyme with rhyme. 

Then, cried I, by that elfin music blest, 

"Although I know not who or where you are, 

Now know I that my heart shall come to rest 
On yours at last beneath a happy star!'' 

But night came down and I grew sore afraid 
Because the darkness silenced all the bells; 

And in the tangled thickets of that glade 
I trod the labyrinths of seven hells. . . . 

Until the day-star brought the carillon 

And made the belfry tremble into song. 

II 

When my heart's door in answer to your knocks 
Creaks on Its rusty hinges, you will come 

Across the portals, darling paradox. 
Who are to my awakened life its sum 

[73] 



r. 



SONNETS FROM UNFINISHED SEQUENCE 

And summit, signal, starting-mark and goal, 
Its sword and armour, spur and golden prize — • 

\ gallant gonfalon unto the soul 
Who learns of honour from your humble eyes I 

You are all beauty in epitome — 

Feather from Gabriel's archangelic wing! 

Laughter and pain, delight and sanctity 

Walk with you, through your vagrant wander- 
ing— 

Who carelessly give what God, ere time began, 

W^rote as His blessing for one lonely man. 

Ill 

If love be fixed beyond the reach of Fate; 

If Time's compelling summons and his sway 

Extend not to the lovers who obey 
A greater lord; if evil days abate 
No smallest tittle of their dear estate; 

If treason cannot trip them in the way; 

If deadliest dooms must make a vain essay 
To batter down love's barred and bolted gate — 

Then even of this hath love such potency. 
That woes his subjects the more closely knit 

[74] 



SONNETS FROM UNFINISHED SEQUENCE 

And strengthen them in their adversity. 

But only lovers know the truth of It, 
Who, looking upward through the deep night, see 

The sky with all Its blissful tapers lit. 

IV 

You, whom my hands have clothed and crowned 
with praise, 
Have charged your poet lover that he write 
Some word to tell how often there alight 

The bitter moods of your ungracious days 

Upon your gracious heart — when all your ways 
Are set with snare and ambush; when, despite 
Your published honour, you yourself unite 

To treasonous folly that your worth betrays. 

Thus will I write It: generous and unjust. 

As I have known you, sweet — capricious, true 

And fickle In a breath — with flame and dust 
Mingled together — seraph, saint and shrew 

In equal parts — ^brave, palsied with mistrust — 
Pitiful, cruel — such, my sweet, are you 1 

V 

No need has this deep love In me to speak 
Of you with fair and flattering falsity, 

[75] 



SONNETS FROM UNFINISHED SEQUENCE 

Yet honour lays its difficult charge on me 
That I among your imperfections seek 
(Please God and find it, too I) your perfect, meek 
And ardent soul. This for an augury 
I held, since one dim evening suddenly 
I saw your goodness naked on your cheek. 

With more than regent Spring's amazing green 
The woods, since then, have been to me aflame; 

From mystery you drew away the screen; 
The world began and ended when you came ; 

And sworn to newer fealty, O my Queen, 

The herald winds were clamant with your 
name! 

VI 

When our gay hearts have laid their glories down; 

When our young bodies mingle with the dust 

From which God made them tender and august; 
When I my singing robe and you your crown 

Have yielded up to wasting moth and rust; 
When even in our own familiar town 

Men mind not our mortality, I trust 
Our lives to live in more than their renown. 

[76] 



SONNETS FROM UNFINISHED SEQUENCE 

For in our children's children love shall be 
Nobler for all the mighty love we knew; 
Holier for pity that has stirred in you, 

Stronger for patience that has grown in me; 
In unborn lovers shall our love renew 

Its mystery and magnanimity. 

VII 

When beauty doffs its mortal vestiture 
Wherewith its lovely spirit was arrayed; 

When time has dissipated light and lure 
From every golden head of every maid, 
Whose body with the loathly worm is laid; 

When these triumphant glories prove unsure 
How shall it fare with you? When these de- 
cayed 

Shall your weak flesh contrive that it endure? 

Lady, you are much greater than all those 

Who used their beauty in their power and 

pride — 
Though such sad beauty be to you denied: 

For carried through the dark a lantern goes, 
And even now I see you glorified — 

As you shall be when all the graves unclose. 

[77] 



SONNETS FROM UNFINISHED SEQUENCE 

VIII 

Beyond the accidents of time and sense 

Love's dim mysterious godhead strangely lies — 
Hidden from all but faith's illumined eyes. 

What ear shall hear his ringing eloquence? 

What probing finger draw his substance thence? 
But we may sup the wine that satisfies, 
And smell the Mystic Rose. The flesh that 
dies 

May hold the deathless soul's magnificence. 

Adulterous race of Scribe and Pharisee, 
Shall any sign be given you to prove 

The risen body — or the mystery 

That eats love's flesh and drinks the blood 
thereof? 

Or any comfort save the blasphemy 
Which is the living gospel of our love. 



[781 



PART IV 



ANNUNCIATION 

NOW doth the chilly earth receive again 
Release from her long servitude to pain; 
For all the snows upon the frozen hills 
Melt, and descend exultant to the plain. 

Now o'er the earth a dress of green is cast 
Where'er the feet of Gabriel have passed; 

The woods and hedges quicken with their bloom 
Which winter had imprisoned and made fast. 

Through every trunk to every budding shoot 
The sap is rising into flower and fruit; 

And, prophesied by Sybil and by seer, 
A rod is growing out of Jesse's root I 

The annunciant angel bends upon his knee 
Before the virginal maternity 

That shall redeem the world! In equal joy 
The new leaves burst from shrub and bush and 
tree! 

For loveliness and laughter, these are hers— • 
The early blossoms and the wind that stirs 

Among them and along the meadow grass 1 
The sun and moon are her bright ministers! 

[8i] 



ANNUNCIATION 

The lark for happiness that sings aloud, 
The open sky, the white, soft-breasted cloud 

Unite to praise her name, with all the stars 
That stand upon the heavens in a crowd. 

Obedient to benignant Law's behest. 

The mating birds build cunningly their nest 

Wherein to welcome soon their unborn young — 
And Mary walks with God beneath her breast I 

Now nature joins with her in wondering 
How could be brought to be this marvellous thing: 
A child conceived of her sweet maidenhood — ■ 
Prime miracle of this miraculous Spring! 

Now from a thousand woodlands notes there 

throng. 
The echoed notes of her celestial song, 
Rehearsal of their own Magnificat; 
"For He hath from their seats deposed the 
strong ; 

"Broken the bands of winter on the earth; 
The humble hath exalted; filled the dearth 

Of hunger!" Shall not all the world be glad 
With Mary, hearing of the promised birth? 

[82] 



, ANNUNCIATION 

The whole creation rises up to bless 
Its God, in her amazing sinlessness 

Crying, *'My soul doth magnify the Lord, 
Who looked upon His handmaid's lowliness!" 

And when the waking spring shall symbolise 
Her Spirit's exaltation and surprise — 

If our eyes should be open, we may see 
The Holy Ghost Who shines within her Eyes I 



[83] 



SIMPLICITY 

To that to which a thing cannot attain by its own nature, 
it must be directed by another; thus, an arrow is shot by 
the archer towards a mark. Hence, properly speaking, a 
rational creature, capable of eternal life, is led towards it, as 
it were, directed by God. 

St. Thomas Aquinas, 
Part I, Question XXIII, Art. I, of the Summa. 

THE heavenly Archer an arrow shot, 
Speeding It straight on Its splendid course, 
Till It hit the mark of the centre spot, 
And dug deep In with eager force. 

Thus Is the soul feathered safe and true, 
Unswerved by the wind nor falling wide, 

Obeying the Archer's eye and thew 
And seeking no other mark In pride. 

But give the arrow a mind and will ; 

Does It fly as shot from the loosened string? 
Can the seasoned bow and the Archer's skill 

Direct the wild and wayward thing? 

If distracted by complexity, 

A hundred targets It seeks at once, 
Is God at default In His archery? 

Shall He or the arrow be thought the dunce? 

[84] 



SIMPLICITY 

If simple and single the arrow yield 

To the heavenly bow and heavenly aim, 

It shall split the wand across the field 
And win the honours of the game I 



[85] 



MEEKNESS 

UPON the Cross, as on a bed, 
He lay; and not a word He said— 
A lamb as to the slaughter led. 

What pride can stand against such meekness? 
What strength can overthrow such weakness ? 

**Thy will not mine accomplished be" — 
But more than pain accepted He 
Between the thieves on Calvary. 

His loneliness and dereliction 
Is Agony's complete perfection. 

Then rang across the fearful sky 
The blasphemous and bitter cry, 
Lama, Lama Sahacthanai! 

Darkened the sun; the moon was shaken 
To see their God by God forsaken. 

For never since the world began 

Had God forsaken any man — 

Till Christ was laid beneath His ban — 

When by the Father unbefriended 
The stricken Son to hell descended. 
[86] 



MEEKNESS 

No consolation could He have 
Who bore our sins our souls to save, 
Who passed, unanswered, to the grave. 

What pride can stand against such meekness? 
What strength can overthrow such weakness ? 



[87] 



PATIENCE 

Take heed and be quiet; fear not, neither let thine heart be 
faint . . . because Syria hath counselled evil against thee. 
Ephraim also, and the son of Remaliah. 

Is. VII, 4-5. 

LET patience have her perfect work, 
Whose strength in quietness shall be — 
Though eyes are bandaged lest they see 
Their God amid the desolate murk. 

Though the abyss should ope its brink 
Yet headlong I shall never sink — 
If patience hath her perfect work. 

Syria and Israel with their kings, 

Two tails of smoking firebrands, flared; 

But strong in hope my spirit dared 
Accomplishment of hopeless things. 

For with my broken strength renewed 

I do not fear your bitter feud, 
Syria and Israel and your kings ! 

For if the God of patience gave 

Such years of patience unto one 

Who stoned the prophets of His Son, 
And slew the Son as a shameful Slave — 

How patient must I be with Him, 

In all His dealings strangely dim, 
For all the patience that He gave ! 

[88] 



TEMPERANCE 

WHAT judgment and authority 
Must hold the balanced mean, 
Hung on a hair, so daintily, 

A difficult point and keen — 
The weight will drop beneath the touch 
Of one small grain of dust too much! 

A perilous adventure this 

To which our feet are led. 
The line 'yond which our joy and bliss 

Are snared and surfeited — 
Let not a coward soul aspire 
To gain a satisfied desire. 

Yet foolish he who would forego 

The use, for fear abuse 
Should lure him to his overthrow — 

For such an one must lose 
The honour and the hearty zest, 
Attendant always on the quest. 

No easy thing he may expect, 
No beaten road and tame, 

[89] 



TEMPERANCE 

Who seeks to save a heaven wrecked 

By hell's infernal flame, 
When virtue armoured cap-a^pie 
Rides out with Law and Liberty. 



[90] 



o 



CHASTITY 

UR hearts grow old, and of experience 
They come at last to tire, 
Longing in vain for their lost innocence 
And for a new desire. 



We see it in a child's unclouded eyes 

As their most lovely grace, 
And are abashed when that strange aura lies 

Upon a human face. 

Yet such are relative, for to the fruit 
Eve stretched her hand and ate — 

In one alone is seen the Absolute, 
Surnamed Immaculate. 

The beasts, unconscious of a mystery, 

Can freely take their fill: 
But man is troubled by virginity. 

Whose hunger haunts him still. 

O, good and evil mingled in that bough 

Among its clustered gold I 
O, sweet and bitter banquet then as now! 

O, hearts grown grey and old ! 

[91] 



CHASTITY 

O, blessed paradox of pain and loss ! 

O, Phoenix from the fire ! 
O, heavenly ore refined from human dross ! 

O, innocent desire ! 



[92] 



THE MANICHEE 

WOULD you then shatter the mould of the 
universe ? 

Shake off the dust 
Of this evil world from your feet with a curse ; 

Its laughter and lust 
Break through as a fetter; and seek a release 

For your dungeoned soul? 
Wing straight to impalpable regions of peace? 

Be at one with the whole 
Of the pure and ethereal spirit that moves 

Through time and the deep? 
Know for treacherous shadows the dreams of 
loves 

Born of life's sleep, 
Where (paradox!) consciousness blindly descends 

On flesh for a spell, 
Making havoc of will, when the Absolute ends 

Our heaven in hell?" 

"Can you tell such as I where such seeming may 
be, 

Draw the curtain, unfold 
The secret of rapture, point the pathway for me 

To the city of gold 

[93] 



THE MANICHEE 

Lying firm on eternity — ^pinnacles, spires 

Upthrusted in air, 
Gates broad to my entering?" 

**Leave your desires ! 

Know ugly for fair! . . . 
Consider the lazar's foul suppurate skin, 

His desolate eye — 
Is he less for his sores? Is his spirit within 

Less perfect thereby? 
Let him scorn his material ills, nor perplex 

The powers of his mind 
With anguish for sins. If mortality vex, 

Let him push it behind!" 

"What if in reaching to God — ^to Him you de- 
clare — 

The soul should reject 
The aids He has left us, the many-runged stair 

Which the senses erect — 
See not or touch not or hear not with awe 

The glory bestowed 
In the good of the earth; lose by breaking the law 

The use of the road?" 

[94] 



THE MANICHEE 

"Crass folly I Mind tangled and snared in the net 

By her pinioned wings 
In a sensual bondage — arise" and forget 

Earth's loveliest things — 
Not as types to be taken, as some will aver, 

To an archetype hid 
In the chaos of God, where no movement can stir 

That pure darkness amid. 
The glittering world was contrived in deceit, 

To allure and betray, 
By the Lord of the Pit — ^^that man's journeying 
feet 

Might wander astray. 
Yet while bound to the body, man freely may pass 

Secure and exempt 
From the woes of the flesh — for since flesh is but 
grass. 

The devils that tempt 
His body to joy, be they not overcome 

(Let him strive if he can!) 
No matter I — they shall not detract from the sum 

Of the stature of man I 
Hence to conclude, let him play if he will 

With the figment of flesh; 

[9S] 



THE MANICHEE 

His scorn for its wiles brings escape from the ill 

And its power to enmesh. 
Does he fear what Is impotent, worthless? Mis- 
trust 

Shakes his soul like the wind. 
But let him despise In the using of lust — 

His body has sinned 
While the soul Is untouched by " 

"The soul is maligned . 

By the doctrine you preach — 
Which makes It much less than God made it! O 
blind, 

Can your fingers not reach. 
To the marvellous triple-fold nature of man, 

Conjolnted of soul 
And spirit and body, whose parts cannot span 

The depth of the whole. 
For soul working upwards galnp through its allies 

Wide kingdoms of joy. 
Attained through the zest of the mind and the 
eyes 

Which the flesh may employ. 
And flesh touching a feather or leaf or a clod. 

With a voice in its ears 

[96] 



THE MANICHEE 

Of challenge, comes up to the threshold of God; 

Slips past the sharp spears 
Of the sentinel angels who cannot withstand 

The force of that word 
(Though it be but a man^s). For as in a green 
land 

Rings the song of a bird, 
So sweet shall man's speech be in God's ears, and 
climb 

To the roof of His throne, 
Whether uttered by sweat or by war, or by rhyme 

Or chiselled in stone ! 
And if by man's labour is worship expressed, 

When he eats or he drinks 
God's will he fulfils, as in beating his breast 

For his sins, — then methinks 
The world has its ritual also, for night 

And the vestmented sun 
Perform in the view of the cosmos their rite; 

The fruitful hills run 
Abounding with symbols and signs of His power, 

When the scattered seed dies, 
To rise in its spring from the dead with the power 

[97] 



THE MANICHEE 

For which death was the price. 
So God shall accept what the grateful earth brings 

As praise to His name, 
And through channels of all the material things 

Blow his quickening flame. 
From out of the wheat takes He flesh, from the 
vine 

His chalice of blood; 
Man's service confirms He with oil for a sign; 

And laves in the flood 
Of the rivers and fountains man's primal dark 
sin — 

Conveying His grace 
By these (you say evil) means, drawing man in 

To the peace of His face. 
Beyond such explicit outpourings of love, 

His blessings are shed, 
Borne on the invisible wings of the Dove, 

To the sweet marriage bed 
Of those who (a blasphemy) learn to attain 

With a clasp and a kiss ! 
Like the brute and the bird they will eat, yet are 
fain 

Of the summits of bliss. 

[98] 



THE MANICHEE 

They will reach what they seek for (let this be 
the test I) 

By their senses' desire, 
And find hidden in lips and the curve of the breast 

Heaven's mystical fire. 
So If his Creator has thought it no shame 

That a man should rejoice 
In the beauty of woman — give praise to His 
name, 

Exultant in voice! 
One word ere my Credo is brought to a close : 

Though your eyes may be sealed 
To the loveliness fresh every day on the rose 

Or the grass of the field — 
Despising (it may be) the moon and each star 

Alight in the skies 
Which you scorn as impostures, though noble they 
are — 

God open your eyes. 
If for only an instant, to see a Child laid 

Asleep on the straw. 
While oxen adore Him, the Son of the Maid, 

And kneel in their awe; 

[99] 



THE MANICHEE 

While the angels proclaim to the listening earth 

That God has been born, 
That the Word is made flesh. ... Go and weep 
in your mirth, 

At the end to your scorn I 



[lOO] 



THE IMAGE OF GOD 

THIS Is the tale of His creations: first 
When from the dust of earth, not yet ac- 
curst, 
He fashioned man. Next when from God there 
burst — 

Breathed as a sigh — a singing star, a soul, 
Wherewith man might perceive, desire, control 
His destiny, conform unto the whole 

Transcendent purpose of his place on earth: 
Bring forth his kind to uncorrupted birth. 
Touch God In mystery, and Eve In mirth. 

But when the plan was shattered by the taste 
Of sweet revolt, the Image was defaced 1 

And Eden with a sword was made a waste. 

Long aeons through, God strove by pestilence 
And prophecy to bring to penitence 
Him who had lost his ancient innocence. 

Long aeons through He failed (though man was 

His, 
Marked with the Godhead's mark, with tears 'and 

bliss, 
Disquietude and arts and silences) ; 

[lOl] 



THE IMAGE OF GOD 

Until, reversing His frustrated plan, 

He broke Himself the barriers of His ban — 

Since man escaped Him, God became a man. 

This was the third creation : born a Child. 
The soul of man with God was reconciled, 
The soul defiled with flesh the undefiled. 

(For in His childish wailings were Implied 
His human pain and weariness, the wide 
Lent of temptation — and the Crucified.) 

* 

Lastly the body was redeemed when He 
Shattered the gravestones piled immovably: 
This mortal put on immortality. 

But we know nothing of our past; we guess 
At what we were ; our troubled longings bless 
Our hearts with happiness and homesickness. 

Nor can our keen Imaginations say 

What we shall be ; none knows the secret way 

Our flesh shall walk on Resurrection Day. . 

Yet are we comforted by mystery, 
The promise of perfection — for we see 
Man taken up Into the Deity. 

[I02] 



FALLAD OF CHRISTMAS NIGHT 

WILL you open to a lost stranger?" 
I cried, as I knocked on the door. 
"Will you open to one who has wandered 
Three hours and more on the moor?" 

No answer replied to the darkness, 
Save the steady drip of the rain. 

But I, who saw light through the keyhole, 
Knocked again . . . again. . . . 

Then one spoke and bade me enter. 

"I know not the way I roam." 
And a young girl spoke to me gently, 

"Here all men are at home." 

In the rays of a single lantern 

A child wrapped in swaddling clothes I saw, 
An old man, and stalls of cattle 

That bit at the bundles of straw. 

The girl's eyes gave me welcome 

To that stable cold and dim. 
Her lips said, "Sir, are you one who has come 

To worship Him?" 

[103] 



BALLAD OF CHRISTMAS-NIGHT 

"For your courtesy I thank you, lady, 

In this stable cold and dim. 
But what folly Is this? Why should I kneel 

And worship Him?" 

*'ThIs Is He Who Is by highest heaven 

Eternally adored. . . . 
Unto us a Child Is given, 

Emmanuel, Christ the Lord." 

I laughed on hearing her folly; 

I laughed at a thing absurd. 
Believing not the word that was spoken 

By the mother of the Word. 

Then though the night was bitter 

And sleet fell with the rain — 
I left them as blasphemous fools, and went 

Out into the night again. . . . 

While I wandered the hills In the darkness, 

Towards the break of day. 
Shepherds cried, *'SIr, we seek a new-born child 

And his mother. Know you the way?" 

I said, being hungry and angry, 
"How should I know the way? 

[104] 



BALLAD OF CHRISTMAS-NIGHT 

Many a woman has borne a child 
On Christmas Day!" 

They only smiled, and answered, 

"The child we seek Is laid 
In a stable, wrapped In swaddling clothes, 

And Is the son of a maid." 

I laughed on hearing their folly; 

I laughed at a thing absurd, 
Believing not the word they had spoken 

Or the mother of the Word. 

And suddenly a multitude of angels 

Sang, as they circled us, 
Gloria in excelsis Deo 

Et pax hominihus . , . . 

I led the way back for the shepherds 

To that stable cold and dim. 
And wept as I said, "Lady, 

We have come to worship Him." 



[105] 



PART V 



TO THE EASTER DEAD (191 8) 

LET no lip call on sorrow I These abide 
Immortal this heroic Easter morn 
(O happiest, holiest hearts of women born I) 
Who crowned our England with a deathless pride, 
When in an hour ten thousand young men died 
With simple valour and with simple scorn; 
When from the fields of battle, red and torn 
Above the guns the voice of glory cried: 

They are not dead who rendered up their breath 

In this tremendous agony of bliss ! 
They are not dead; No shadow summoneth 

Their shining souls to its obscure abyss ! 
They are not dead whom an undying death 

Hath married to herself with such a kiss ! 



[109] 



TO FRANCE 

O MISTRESS of the vine and song and dance, 
Who knows thee only In thy revelry, 
Knows not the majesty that dwells in France — 
Guardian of honour and of liberty! 

To thy great fashioning all great things come : 
Laughter of Rabelais and the Maid's lance 
hand; 

The saints and poets of our Christendom, 
Were melted for the minting of thy land. 

The tumbrils full of cargoes of high kings 

Creaked slowly up the long and dreadful way. 

When, grown as vain as fools' Imaginings, 
The world was burnt as stubble in a day. 

Still in the air thy lordly eagle sits. 

Who fears no heat or light of any sun; 

Did he not spread his wings o'er Austerlitz, 
Where ended what at Valmy was begun? 

Can one thing from the earth's strong story thrive, 
While stands the granite of the black Bastille — 

Or if that France that kept our souls alive, 
Be trampled by the proud barbarian's heel? 



THE PARADOX OF VICTORY 

{For the Fourth Anniversary of War.) 

HOW shall we live who look, O Lord, 
Upon the anger of Thy Face? 
How shall we dare to draw the sword 
Unless Thy Mercy give us Grace? 

How shall we see Ithuriel's spear, 

Or Michael's shield ablaze with stars, 

Or watch the hosts go up, or hear 
The challenges of Thy great Wars? 

For we have sinned, and kept apart 
The opposites that mix and run 

Together — though within Thy heart 
Pity and wrath are fused in one I 

The dread ineffable I AM 

To His confounding conflict goes : 

The valour of the wounded Lamb 
The roaring lion overthrows I 

Oh, dark mysterious Irony 

That laughs to scorn the mighty Kings, 
And panoplies with victory 

The last and least of earth's weak things I 
fin] 



THE PARADOX OF VICTORY 

Btrt Thou despite our weary pride 
Didst give us — O Magnanimous I — 

A cause for which our young men died 
And brought our honour back to us: 

To us, grown sick with years of ease, 
Thy loud and ringing summons came, 

With passion lovelier than peace, 
With folly nobler than our fame. 

But humble us that we may win 
Our glorious goal of enterprise; 

Lest, unrepentant of our sin. 
We lose the vision in our eyes. 



[112] 



THE LAST CRUSADE 

BEHOLD a paradox! The crescent moon 
Above these holy hills is on the wane, 
Where once the shuddering, awe-struck sun at 
noon 
Hid his bright face before a young man slain I 

Here for redemption of the sepulchre, 

Wherein the murdered Prince of Life was laid, 

Crusaders rode and sang the name of her 

Who gave the Word His body from a Maid. 

Lewis the Saint of thorns and knotted cord 

Here failed, although his heart grew clean and 
large; 

Yet honour glittered on a Christian sword 
When Richard led his barons to the charge. 

Now is attained the goal of fruitless years; 

And from their graves the royal ghosts arise, 
And marshal horsemen with invisible spears 

And happy hunger in their hollow eyes. 

For in that quiet town of Nazareth — 

Where heaven was conscious in a growmg boy, 

[113] 



THE LAST CRUSADE 

Walked Its white streets, and drew of human 
breath 
Ere Golgotha made an end of Mary's joy — 

The last crusade, on this heroic day, 

The banners and the arms of Christendom 

Carries to victory, while the nations pray, 

"Thy kingdom come on earth, Thy kingdom 
come." 



[114] 



THE CITY OF THE DEAD 

BENEATH your carven cross of stone, 
Lie still within your house of clay, 
In this grey city, all your own. . . . 

Above amid the light of day, 
Men trudge their dull and dusty round. 

And count their gold and sell their shame, 
While you in glory underground 
Live with an unforgotten name. 

O ghosts of all the million dead 

Whose hearts are empty and forlorn 
For women you can never wed 

And children never to be born — 
Remember that your sacrifice 

Has brought a ransomed world to birth. 
And that your dying was the price 

Of all the good that lives on earth. 

Remember that the soil you keep 
Is English soil, the soil of home, 

The silent city of your sleep 

Renowned like Athens or like Rome— • 

[115] 



THE CITY OF THE DEAD 

For we remember it, and hold 

The sacred graveyards where you He 

As English as the wood and wold 
You loved before you came to die! 



[ii6] 



THE NEW WORLD 

WITH what strange markings shall the world 
arise? 
Made new and lovely to our waiting eyes? 
Or stagger forth decrepit, grey and old, 
Among a crowd of men whose hearts are cold 
With love of gain and luxury and ease? 
Shall we adventure on heroic seas 
And find a new Atlantis In the main — 
Or pass, our ardent agonies grown vain, 
Into a night of dense obscurity 
Oblivious of our splendid history? 

But I who sing where the two roads divide 

Of that dear hope for which our young men 

died — 
Freedom and honour made secure on earth — 
Behold the vast titanic pangs of birth 
Racking the body of the Universe; 
And, seeing them, I know the apparent curse 
Under whose ban we lie will pass away; 
That even now the footsteps of the day 
Thunder along the Immemorial hills. 

[117] 



THE NEW WORLD 

But, knowing it, I know our weary wills 

Must gird themselves again with might, that we 

May fit our souls to drink of liberty. 



[ii8] 



PART VI 



SIX EPITAPHS 



For a Minor Poet nuho nvas disappointed in love and died of 

grief 

Take up the carcase — all that's left of me — 
And drown it in an undiscovered sea, 
Or let the grass grow rank and forest-high 
To cover up the lost grave where I lie. 

For I can wish no man to find a trace 
Of one who carried gladness on his face — 
But who was conquered by the Fates at last, 
And in a tumult of derision passed. 

After he gave a lady all he knew 

Of song, that his own true love might come true, 

She soured his laughter into bitterness, 

And changed his deep desire to deep distress. 

Yet it is certain far beyond denial 
That of the proffered love she made fair trial 
Ere tossing it aside — Oh, ponder human I 
What mould of man was this? What mould of 
woman ? 

[121] 



SIX EPITAPHS 



II 



For a Philanthropist, vjho, after a long and useful life, 
*tvas impartially praised even by the newspapers which he 
did not own. 

How shall the paupers* children learn to sneeze,* 

How shall their parents fumigate their fleas, 

If your advising tongue now silent is 

Down in the wide Cimmerian abyss? 

Unless, indeed, youVe taken (as we hope) 

The Heights of heaven with a cry of SOAP! 

And made the angels sing to harps of gold 

Canticles nobler than they hymned of old. 

Concerning destitution, lunacy. 

And the bad effects of private charity — 

Persuading God with your smooth eloquence. 

That the present system of His Providence 

Has grown defective in its working, and 

Extremely difficult to understand; 

And that it loudly calls for strict revision 

By some expert Committee or Commission. . . . 

If this be as we hope, then all is well 

And King Beelzebub may laugh in hell — 

* See the dead man's contribution to the Symposiom en- 
titled: "Parentage among the Poor," in which he describes 
and advocates the hygenic way of sneezing so as to minimise 
the risk of germ infection. 

[I22] 



SIX EPITAPHS 

For though to your celestial seat youVe gone, 
The social uplift still can carry on I 

III 

For a Housemaid, <vjho overheard through a keyhole a Cabinet 
Minister at his devotions in Dovjning Street, and nuho died of 
the consequent shock. 

Yours was the lot to carry up the stairs 

Towels and shaving water, boots and coal — 
But not to pry into the secret prayers, 

The virgin whiteness of your master's soul. 
Leapt with a dagger murderous surprise — 

The shock, the struggle and the death-stroke 
given ! — 
To hear those lips so used to telling lies 

Professing faith before the throne of heaven. 

IV 

For a noble tree that ivas chopped down and sold by its ignoble 

owner. 

You never feared the wind's strong charge and 
clamour; 
Rooted impregnably rock-deep you stood — 
Till axes struck your heart as with a hammer 
Before the quaking wood! 

[123] 



SIX EPITAPHS 

O death magnificent! A sight for wonder! 

Cataclysmic fell you as an Empire falls: 
As when the boastful Greeks destroyed in thunder 

Troy's tall, resplendent walls ! 

Yet shall your limbs be shaped to beam and rafter; 

Bacon shall hang from you before a fire, 
Where honest men may sit with ale and laughter 

And all that they desire. 



V 

For my Greatest Enemy, laying upon Kls foul body and 
fouler soul what I think they deserve. 

Beneath this stone and this engraven verse 
Lies one I still would follow with a curse. 
I heap upon him in his dismal gloom, 
A malediction to disturb his tomb : 
May all the worms that eat his body bite 
With teeth made bitter in the pools of night, 
Sharp teeth and poisoned, that shall tear and burn 
His loins and liver, heart and eyes in turn; 
May decent people whiten in the face 
To hear of spectres round his burial place; 
And may the screech-owl chaunt a hideous tune 

[124] 



SIX EPITAPHS 

Beside his grave beneath a blood-shot moon; 
May the black horsemen halloo on their hounds 
Till old men shudder at the dreadful sounds ; 
And may his soul taste not Lethean springs, 
Which with oblivion ease the happenings 
Of those infernal labyrinths, through which 
Go the unlovely and the proud and rich ; 
But may this ringing curse torment him there 
And plunge him deep and deeper in despair . . . . 
So would I curse him — but the truth to tell — 
There is no man I like not passing well. 

VI 

For Myself, ivritten in an hour of monumental egotism. 

Here is a man, unquestionably dead. 

Of whom, when all the blackest has been said, 

(And Lord! what lies and legends folks could tell 

Of one whom duns and devils drove to hell — 

Which is the reason, lest the world should laugh. 

That he discreetly writes his epitaph!) 

It may be claimed that to the very end 

He kept the heart of every splendid friend. 

And he had many; that he would not do 

Some things — though he had vices not a few; 

[125] 



SIX EPITAPHS 

That though despair closed in and held him fast 
He kept his foolish courage to the last, 
And joy alive . . . that much he well may claim 
For this poor fellow who has borne his name. 



[126] 



PART VII 



AN INSCRIPTION WRITTEN WITH A 

NEW FOUNTAIN PEN USED FOR 

THE FIRST TIME 

TO what less worthy uses shall This Pen 
Be driven when I take It up again? 
But now with Its virginity I write 
A sentence that shall keep your memory bright. 
If afterwards It lose Its Eden, falling 
To disrepute and infamy appalling, 
Yet Its existence h^s been justified 
(If only for an instant). For with pride 
It well may ponder in base dotage : Song 
For one glad moment did to me belong 
And I — I swell to think of it — once moved 
To praise the lady that my master loved. 



[129] 



THE DENIAL 

DENYING beauty, on we go and on 
Into the sandy desert of the mind 
Where no tree grows, no fruitful thing or kind. 
The mirage of reality is gone 

The instant that we look at it. We find 
No resting-place. The moon that last night shone, 
The naked moon has no pavilion 

In which to hide. The sun has made us blind. 

The sun can cast no shadow on the grass. 

No moonlight trembles through the twisted 
boughs. 
All is as blatant and as bright as brass, 

A clarity without perspective. Lost I . . • 
Amid a wilderness without a house . . . 

Stripped of the mysteries of clouds and frost ! 



[130] 



A FISHERMAN'S STORY 

IN waters deep and dim 
The fishes glance and glide, 
Or by the lake's green rim 
'Neath roots of rushes hide. 

They rise to snatch a fly; 

They leap into the air: 
The ripples fade and die 

And are not anywhere. 

I steal my fingers in ; 

I touch a gleaming scale, 
A swift, elusive fin, 

The flicker of a tail. 

Sometimes (more luck than skill 1) 

I bring a live fish out, 
My happy fingers thrill 

With gold-fish or with trout. 

But oh, the fish I lose I 
The silver scales and gold! 

The thousands in the ooze 
For every one I hold 1 

[131] 



BALLADE OF BEELZEBUB 

IT'S not that youVe been rude to me a bit — 
Indeed, your charming courtesies compel 
My clumsy thanks, and all the rest of it. 

I've dined at your expense ; the Muscatel 
Was excellent and had no parallel. 
I never tasted better Caviare; 

But (pardon me for using doggerel) 
But who the devil do you think you are? 

I recognize your aphoristic wit. 

Your grammar's good; and you can even spell. 
Infinitives by you are never split ; 

And you can turn a sonnet very well. 

At ballades, why, at ballades you excel 
(I wish I did!) ; I'd have to travel far 

To find a smarter literary swell — 
But who the devil do you think you are? 

I'd like you better rising from the Pit 

With horns and cloven hoofs and horrid yell — 

Than here, where the electric light is lit, 
And where a button somehow rings a bell 
In this luxurious up-to-date hotel — 

[132] 



BALLADE OF BEELZEBUB 

The smoke that's curling from your good cigar 
Dispells the brimstone's more obnoxious 
smell — 
But who the devil do you think you are ? 



ENVOI 

Prince of the Darkness, Lord of hate and hell, 
Who dropped from heaven blazing like a star, 

You say you've heard I have a soul to sell . . . 
But who the devil do you think you ar;e ? 



[133I 



BALLADE OF A LOST ROAD * 

IT was in ways beset with gloom, 
Where tangle branches overhead 
Of trees whereon no blossoms bloom 
Save those which are already dead, 
That some malignant spirit led 
My steps astray, and did entice 

Me down to where all hopes are sped— 
I lost the road to Paradise. 

Calamitous that day of doom 

When Eden's apples glistened red, 

And Eva whispered to her groom 
Of what the lying Serpent said I 
O, sour the fruit on which they fed — 

Which they had thought as sweet as spice 
When Eden was untenanted 

I lost the road to Paradise. 



♦This ballade was written, with a refrain agreed upon by 
us, in a poetic bout with Mr. Charles Williams. It is hardly 
necessary to say that his was a much better ballade. St. 
Bonaventure and St. Thomas Aquinas were commissioned to 
write an office for the newly instituted Feast of Corpus Ckristi. 
When the two doctors came to read their versions to the 
adjudicating commission the lot fell to St. Thomas to read his 
version first. As he reached each new part of the office St. 
Bonaventure tore his own version up, so that when St. Thomas 
had reached the end, all St. Bonaventure had to show was a 
pile of pieces that had been his manuscript. 

I should have followed his example — but alas, I am not a 
saint! 



[134] 



BALLADE OF A LOST ROAD 

I sat within the Upper Room ; 

'Twas I who took the sop of bread; 
I sealed the Ineffective tomb ; 

I trembled for my skin and fled; 

I stood and mocked Him while he Med ; 
And for His coat I rattled dice; 

I tore it into strip and shred; 
I lost the road to Paradise. 

ENVOI 

Prince of the Portals, I have plead 
With naught of cunning or device — 

My rags of poor excuse are shed — 
I lost the road to Paradise. 



[135I 



BEAUTY BENEATH WHOSE HAND . . . 

BEAUTY, beneath whose hand we make 
All that is noble in our lives, 
When passionate desires awake 

And will, grown energetic, strives — 
We hear the doom and dread decree 
Thou sendest forth to pleasure thee. 

Denied and dear and perilous! 

Our first, our last, our mightiest love I 
Brooking no rival, tyrannous — 

As all thy votaries can prove — 
Who, loving thee, have lived and died 
With their desire unsatisfied. 

We choose thee — and thou sendest pain; 

We seek thee — and thou tarriest long; 
Thou takest toll of nerve and brain. 

And tears are in our happiest song; 
Our hopeless ardours are content 
Rewarded by their punishment. 

But they who fainted in the quest, 

Like those who bartered thee for gold, 
Cry out from their unquiet rest, 

[136] 



BEAUTY BENEATH WHOSE HAND . . . 

"Bring back, bring back the days of old 
The days of rapturous agony!" 
Be still. Decay. It may not be. 

From pang to sharper pang we go, 
With burning hearts and bleeding feet, 

From woeful bliss to blissful woe — 
Till Beauty, from her heavenly seat 

Bends down to heal us, breaks her rod, 

And blinds us with the face of God. 



[137] 



EPILOGUE 

GREAT joy is his who has been doomed from 
birth 

To seek the glittering shadow of that 
beauty 
Which God has cast upon the minds of men, 
Whereof He is at once the object shadowed, 
And the intolerable light that casts 
The semblance of itself upon the world. 

Great joy is his, hunger unsatisfied. 
An exultation o'er the thing discovered, 
A fiercer exultation o'er the thing concealed 
From his adventurous and happy heart. 

For well he knows that his felicities 

Of form and colour or of haunted music 

Are but uncertain shadows of a shadow. 

He chooses rhymes that he may make them ring 

In correspondence with the eternal Word, 

Like bells to answer those celestial belfries 

Whose chimes he faintly heard in faded dreams. 

His rhythms are the faltering counterpart 

Of that ineffable beauty that declares 

The orderings of intellectual law. 

Self-evident, incomprehensible. 

[138] 



EPILOGUE 

Great joy in his who finds in human love 

The image of unconsummated bliss, 

The peace of God that passeth understanding; 

Whoever in his mortal marriage hungers 

To eat the marriage supper with the Lamb, 

According to his ardour is he aware 

Of beauty perishable, inviolate — 

Perishable as the fleshly husk decays, 

Inviolate spiritual virginity. 

Which shall effect for body and for soul 

A pure and perfect ravishment of desire. 

Great joy is his, forever unsatisfied. 
His happiness made sharp by lonely longing. 
Until a blinding beauty burn his eyes 
And cleanse his wild astonished heart with pas- 
sion. 



[139 J 



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